Anchors aweigh for strikeouts, 'l337' computer language

What is the origin of the nautical term "away" as in "Anchors Away," the title of the U.S. Navy's official song?

Um, it's not "away." It's "aweigh."

According to the Navy, the word is an archaic term meaning to hoist or heave or raise.

When an anchor is lifted from the ocean floor, it is said to be aweigh.

As long as we're discussing word origins, let's consider this matter:

When keeping a scorecard for a baseball game, what is the origin of using "K" for a strikeout?

My old man tried a few times to teach me how to score a ball game but he finally gave up on that, just as he gave up on trying to teach me how to play bridge. I think as his partner I'd trumped his ace or aced his trump or something like that. I disremember.

Anyway, the "K" for strikeout is usually credited to a New York City journalist named Henry Chadwick, who pretty much invented our present-day box scores. He used "K" as the last letter in "struck," meaning "struck out."

In the course of working on this column, I came across the word w00t. I suppose I'm the last person in the world to hear of this. It was Merriam-Webster's word-of-the-year in 2007.

It is an expression of joy that seems to have originated among players of competitive online gambling games. It is from a computer-hacker language called l337.

I learned all that at grammar .quickanddirtytips.com.

What is the origin of the phrase "to make no bones about" something?

The phrase, which means to speak frankly or without hesitation, dates back to the 15th century when it wasn't unusual to find slivers of bone in your soup. If your soup didn't have any bones in it, you would slurp it up without hesitation.